Hello Dig Deeper friends,

Our team has decided that we’re going to “pause” the Dig Deeper for the remainder of summer. When we began the Dig Deeper years ago, our intent was to curate articles from the Bound Volumes to support the study of the weekly CS Bible Lesson and to encourage church members to visit our CS Reading Room at 1434 Pearl Street in Boulder, Colorado. And now, years later, we have a couple hundred people reading the Dig Deeper from around the country and beyond.

So, while we’re “pausing” the Dig Deeper, perhaps all of the Dig Deeper readers could consider going into their local Reading Room to search through the Bound Volumes. Perhaps pick up an early volume and read through it, or perhaps look for articles relevant to the week’s CS Bible Lesson. We also would consider it a compliment if other Reading Rooms started their own Dig Deeper…and feel free to share it with us!

And now for our final Dig Deeper before our “pause.”

Our first article is from the October 1883 issue of The Christian Science Journal. The article is “The New Birth, and is by Mary B. G. Eddy, “St. Paul speaks of what we understand to be the new birth as ‘waiting for the adoption, to wit, the redemption of the body.’ The Scripture saith, ‘none but the pure in heart shall see God;’ nothing aside from the spiritualization, yea, the highest christianization of thought and desire, can give the true perception of God and divine Science and their results in health, happiness, and holiness. The new birth is not the work of a moment; it begins with moments, and goes on with years—moments of surrender to God, of childlike trust and joyful adoption of good; moments of self-abnegation, self-consecration, heaven-born hope and spiritual love.

Time may commence, but it cannot complete, the new birth,—eternity does this,—for progress is the law of Infinity.”

https://journal.christianscience.com/shared/view/ku27azbpd2?s=copylink

 

Our second article is called “Mistakes,” and lists no author (it includes a poem):  

Somewhere we have read, that there are two ways of treating mistakes.

One way is to let them alone making no attempts to correct them or learn any thing from them. The other is, to study carefully and learn the secret of them that they may not be made again. The latter way is the one we propose to adopt as student-editor pro tem of this Journal.

As in the best regulated families errors are made, it is hardly probable that the management of a periodical taking a stand against the prejudices of the ages will carry itself invariably wisely.

With all lapses from Wisdom’s ways fellow students and readers are urged to be lenient and invited to suggest recommendations.

“The shady nooks and corners

Wherein we dwell with God.

And conquer pain and weakness.

Sustained by staff and rod;

Perhaps in all earth’s journey

Naught sweeter shall we know

Than just the sanctuaries,

Where hidden graces grow.”

From the September 1884 issue of The Christian Science Journal

https://journal.christianscience.com/shared/view/2df14gxm5yk?s=copylink

And our third article is “A change of thought brings healing,” by Eva-Maria Hogrefe, who writes:

When a blemish appeared on my face, I wasn’t concerned at first. But when it began to grow, I began to pray for healing. Often I open at random the Bible and Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures by Mary Baker Eddy to focus my prayer, and one day I noticed a question: “What are the motives for [your] prayer?” (p. 2). I thought the answer was, “To heal that unsightly spot on my face.”

But was my motive really concern about what others might think? Here I was, someone committed to healing others—a “wounded” Christian healer—who was finding her own spiritual progress, or lack of it, daily in the spotlight as a Christian Science practitioner. Nevertheless, I continued my healing prayer, and my joy in it was unabated.

One afternoon, a passage in Science and Health was especially significant to me: “Become conscious for a single moment that Life and intelligence are purely spiritual,—neither in nor of matter,—and the body will then utter no complaints” (p. 14). I was fascinated and inspired by the thought that just a moment of understanding the truth about divine intelligence, the Mind of each of us, could be that powerful.

Well, flesh couldn’t speak—”utter”—to me and tell me what my condition was or wasn’t. It was inarticulate, nonintelligent. The body only reflects our state of thought. But I could listen to God to know my condition, because God is Truth. Angel thoughts from God told me that He was All and that He was good and that therefore I had nothing to fear.

For those few moments I became powerfully aware of God and His great goodness. As I continued my prayer, I was completely wrapped up in my love for Him. It was a wonderful thing, and it gave me rest; I relaxed and was at peace. At that moment, the physical healing of a growth was less important to me than my encounter with the calm, dear presence of God.

I knew that even though the healing wasn’t yet visible on my face, it was mentally tangible.

A few days later, as I was taking an elevator down to the lobby of my apartment building, I joined a man who turned out to be a doctor. He looked at me and at that spot on my face, and matter-of-factly, but kindly, asked if I was doing something about it. “Skin cancer needs immediate attention,” he said.

For a moment I was speechless. Then I thanked him for his interest and said that I was receiving the best healthcare I knew. I wanted to say more, but the elevator stopped; we exited and parted. I thought, “How can that dear doctor be so sure from just looking at that spot? But, what if he is right?” Fearful thoughts started to nag at me.

Shortly afterward, I read in Science and Health, my sourcebook for spiritual self-awareness, that “anatomy, when conceived of spiritually, is mental self-knowledge, and consists in the dissection of thoughts to discover their quality, quantity, and origin. Are thoughts divine or human? That is the important question” (p. 462).

I asked myself, “What is the quality of my thoughts? Are they spiritual or personal? Is their origin in God or in guesswork?” If I believed I was vulnerable, my thoughts were not based on divine intelligence but on human assumptions.

I realized how vulnerable I had become to certain comments and behaviors of people I saw every day. I had been oversensitive to what I thought were judgmental or even prejudiced attitudes toward me. I knew these were mostly my perceptions. But I also knew that I was the one in charge of my thinking. So I began to pray for a thorough, spiritual overhaul of my thinking. And at that point I stopped praying specifically about a malignant growth.

Prayer to me means joyful listening to God for what He knows about me. Divine intelligence highlights the very best, the most useful, spiritual facts of my experience, and He shows me how to manage wisely my thoughts and feelings.

Two lines of a poem strikingly express what I felt at the time: “Love and I had the wit to win,/We drew a circle that took him in.” As I drew a circle of love around all I did, I was able to see others and myself in a larger context of goodness—that we all mirrored the one God, who is Love.

I began to understand my neighbor and myself better as creations of the same Parent, and oversensitivity to what others thought or said about me was replaced by sensitivity to our common spirituality. With that change of thought, my confidence and strength were restored.

The healing of the skin condition came almost as a by-product. The discoloration stopped spreading, and eventually the spot disappeared. This happened over six years ago, and the healing has been permanent.

Beyond my deep gratitude for this healing, I’m especially grateful for understanding a bit better now what Jesus meant when he said, “Ye shall know the truth, and the truth shall make you free” (John 8:32). The truth about God and His creation revealed that I was and am inherently free.

https://sentinel.christianscience.com/shared/view/2bvrxq0texo?s=copylink

Christian Science Sentinel APRIL 21, 2003 ISSUE

The Dig Deeper team selects articles each week to support your study of the Bible Lesson. Here in Boulder, the Reading Room staff can show you the extensive Bound Volumes where these featured articles were published.  If you can’t make it to our Reading Room, you can also look them up with the links in JSH Online.  We are now partnering with the Twentieth Church of Christ, Scientist Reading Room.  You may visit them at 132 Brooks Ave., Los Angeles (Venice Beach), CA 90291 (310) 396-1390.  Or visit their website: http://20csvenice.com/

For listings of Christian Science Lectures around the country and world go to https://www.christianscience.com/find-us/find-a-lecture.

We are grateful when you find the Dig Deeper helpful and while we try to edit carefully, we do hope you forgive any mistakes. If you would like to contact us, please call 303-442-0335.

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https://groups.google.com/a/cschurchboulder.org/g/digdeeper/about